"Godard is a constant source of inspiration. Before I do
anything, I go back and look at as many of his films as I can, as a reminder of
what’s possible."-Steven Soderbergh

Academy Award winning director Steven Soderbergh has directed
over twelve films. From his critically acclaimed debut, sex, lies, and
videotape, Oscar winner Traffic, to box office hit, Ocean's Eleven.
While his films cover a variety of different subject matter, his directorial
style remains somewhat constant. Much of his style seems to stem from his
fascination with the French New Wave movement. His utilizing of Francois
Truffaut’s The 400 Blows freeze frame is evident in the narrative
structure of the 1998 film Out of Sight while his use of color themes in
Traffic seems to harken back to the opening scene of Jean-Luc Godard's
Contempt. Furthermore, many of Soderbergh's films incorporate breaks in the
180 degree line, jump cuts, direct address, and an all out attack on
conventional Hollywood cinema. It becomes clear, when looking at the films in
Soderbergh’s filmography, that much of his directorial style lies within the
roots of the French New Wave.

In order to look at Soderbergh’s French New Wave roots, the
roots of the French New Wave must first be noted. The beginning of the French
New Wave can be traced as far back as 1955 with the production of Jean-Pierre
Melville’s noir Bob le Flambeur. However, it was not until the 1959 when
Francois Truffaut screened his autobiographical film The 400 Blows at
Cannes that the French New Wave officially took hold. The filmmakers of the
French New Wave revolted against what was considered classical French cinema and
praised the conventions of commercial Hollywood cinema because of the embracing
of film auteurs like Hitchcock and Hawks.

Furthermore, as seen in Godard’s 1960 film Breathless,
the New Wave challenged the "polished French cinema of quality" with what was
considered a casual look (Bordwell Thompson, 420). Cinematography was also
influenced by the New Wave. Movement became increasingly common with the
utilization of panning and tracking shots to the use of hand-held cameras. While
the movement seemed to end in 1964, it gave rise to a simular movement of the
popular independent Hollywood film which went against the conventions set forth
by Hollywood. Soderbergh was one of the founding members with his 1989 debut
film, sex, lies, and videotape.

With the exception of some of the long takes and the reflexive
role of the camera in sex, lies, and videotape, the influence of the
French New Wave in Soderbergh’s early films seems pale in comparison with the
films that graced the middle of his on going career. It was not until 1996 when
Soderbergh produced Gray’s Anatomy and Schizopolis that the New
Wave’s influence seemed to take on full potency. As seen in his published
journals, dating from the post-production of both films in early 1996 to
pre-production of Out of Sight in early 1997, Soderbergh became
increasingly upset with the Hollywood system and ventured into guerrilla
filmmaking. His first film to become a product of this hiatus, Gray’s Anatomy,
consisted entirely of an eighty minute monologue by Spalding Gray regarding
problems with his eye sight. In the film, Soderbergh utilized one of the
characteristics of the New Wave movement: direct address. Conventional Hollywood
cinema criticizes an actor who looks at the camera. The response to direct
address is even more looked down upon. However, by allowing Gray to address the
camera, Soderbergh created less of a barrier between the audience and the
subject, thus making the film more personal.

Soderbergh’s second film of 1996, Schizopolis,
exemplified further the French New Wave influence on his films. Jump cuts are
increasingly common, giving the film what is commonly considered a "sloppy"
feel. In the interrogation scene of the paranoid-schizophrenic exterminator,
Elmo Oxygen, Soderbergh utilizes this visual technique numerous times to provide
a temporal ellipsis. Visual style aside, Soderbergh also adds unconventional
narrative techniques to the film. For example, during the film’s self-proclaimed
third act, Fletcher Munson (Soderbergh) and his wife (Soderbergh’s wife at the
time, Betsy Brantley) experience comical marital dispute and lack personal
communication. Soderbergh, aside from making this obvious in his performance and
Brantley’s, makes this breakdown of communication literal by having his
character speak various foreign languages while his wife speaks English. This,
of course, is not a technique commonly seen or embraced in conventional
Hollywood cinema. However, casual humor is a characteristic commonly found in
New Wave films. For example, a variation of this technique is seen in Godard’s
Band Of Outsiders when all three main characters resolve to be silent for
a moment and Godard literally makes the scene mute of all sound.

Soderbergh’s return to Hollywood in 1997 brought forth one of
his most acclaimed films, the adaptation of Elmore Leonard’s noir Out of
Sight. The film was nominated for numerous Academy Awards, including one for
Anne V. Coates for best editing. It is the editorial techniques in Out of
Sight that showcase much of the characteristics of the French New Wave. One
of the most evident visual traits of the film is Soderbergh’s continual use of
freeze frames. As previously noted, this first appeared in the final shot of
Traffaut’s The 400 Blows. While Traffaut used his freeze frame to give
the film an ambiguous ending, Soderbergh utilizes his temporally to lend the
film a stream of consciousness effect. For example, when Jack (George Clooney)
and Buddy (Ving Rhames) are left behind by Glen after the jail break, Soderbergh
flashes back to one of the first instances in which the duo met Glen. Time does,
however, catch up with itself. This occurs as the window between past and future
narrows during the cross cutting of the scenes in the bar and Karen’s hotel
room. As Jack and Karen are making love and are preparing to make love, the
freeze frames become increasingly common until the two events occur within the
same moment. This leads to the final freeze frame of the film and a fade to
black, separating the past from what has become the present.

Soderbergh’s follow up, 1999’s The Limey, also
incorporated an editorial technique common in French New Wave films:
discontinuity editing. Most notably evident in the opening scene of Godard’s
Breathless, this technique makes the viewer confused to the character’s
spatial relationship to their surroundings. Most of this confusion stems from
the lack of an establishing shot and frequent breaks across the 180 degree line.
These traits are seen numerous times in The Limey. The best example,
however, is during the Wilson’s (Terence Stamp) monologue to Elaine (Lesley Ann
Warren). Soderbergh shoots this exchange in numerous settings ranging from a
restaurant, a boardwalk, to a hotel room and intercuts them together. By doing
so and not altering the audio track to include an ellipsis, Soderbergh not only
makes the audience unsure of where the true conversation took place but
disorientates them. The utilization of this technique also visually encourages
the audience to question the point of view and information they are being given
in the narrative.

The following year not only brought Soderbergh the major success
of his two latest films, Erin Brockovich and Traffic, but an
Academy Award nomination for the former and a win for the later. Traffic
became the perfect hybrid of Soderbergh’s Hollywood and guerrilla filmmaking.
Like his previous films, much of the style Soderbergh displays on Traffic
seems to stem from his fascination with the French New Wave. The most notable of
the two techniques is that of the color themes for each of the locales the film
takes place in. Mexico is basked in a washed out yellow while Ohio is left to
soak in cold blue tones, giving the audience a visual reference to each
location. This technique, while utilized in a different context, seems to be
taken from the opening scene in Godard’s Contempt. Contempt,
Godard’s first venture into the realm of French film industry, is notable for
its unconventional use of cinescope and technicolor. The first scene is
accentuated with the extremely reflexive movement of changing colored filters on
one take, making the scene go from a dark red, yellow, to dark blue while the
audience watches the filters change over the camera lens.

The second, most notable, French New Wave property exemplified
in Traffic is Soderbergh’s use of the hand-held camera. This technique
was utilized in both Truffaut’s The 400 Blows and Godard’s Breathless
in order to allow the audience to explore space. Soderbergh does the same but
adds the common feeling of un-balance to these shots. For example, while
pursuing Helena (Catherine Zeta-Jones) through the streets of Tijuana,
Soderbergh lets the camera jitter. This gives the audience a feeling of realism
by visually not allowing a person’s walk to appear perfectly smooth like a
stedicam would.

Following his success with Traffic, Soderbergh brought
audiences the big budgeted remake of the Rat Pack film, Ocean’s Eleven.
Starring George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Matt Damon, and Julia Roberts, Ocean’s
Eleven also became Soderbergh’s most successful and most conventional film.
However, even his most conventional film was not untouched by the New Wave. For
example, Livingston Dell’s (Edward Jemison) frustrating encounter with the
casino’s computer is graced with jump cuts to ellipse time. Furthermore, direct
address and the reflexive technique of coming into focus are utilized when Rusty
approaches towards the camera dressed as a doctor. However, Soderbergh’s next
feature, Full Frontal, would prove to be a full reversal on Ocean’s
Eleven.

Supplementing all copies of the screenplay to Full Frontal,
Soderbergh authored his infamous list of rules for the stars demanding
everything from personally driving themselves to the set, picking and providing
their own wardrobe, maintaining their own hair and make-up, not allowing
trailers or personal free time, and encouraging improvisation. Furthermore, the
film was to be shot on digital video handicams with a shooting schedule only
lasting eighteen days. This film was clearly not going to be what was considered
conventional Hollywood cinema. Soderbergh, in the commentary on the recently
released DVD, compares the film to the work of Godard and the French New Wave
and this can clearly be seen in the film. From the use of direct address, soft
focus, jump cuts, and other examples of discontinuity editing, Full Frontal
embodies the very essence of the French New Wave and it is clear, looking
through Soderbergh’s filmography, that this historical film movement touches
almost every one of his films.